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Abstract Species that have become rare or endangered due to human disturbance are at increased risk of extinction as a result of environmental, demographic, and genetic stochasticity. Smaller populations, which can be typical of endangered species, are especially vulnerable to loss of variation through stochastic events. For 10 populations of Platanthera leucophaea (Nuttall) Lindley (Orchidaceae), a threatened species, genetic variation at allozyme and random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) loci was measured to assess the potential effects of fragmentation and reduced population size on the future viability of populations. Allozymes revealed very low levels of diversity (A P = 1.18; P P = 12%; H O = 0.008) and high levels of population differentiation (F ST = 0.75). Additionally, inbreeding coefficients were very high in five of the 10 populations surveyed, due largely to the fixation of alternative alleles at two loci in different populations. In contrast, every individual displayed a unique RAPD fingerprint, yielding higher levels of polymorphism (P P = 45%) and gene diversity (Nei's H = 0.159). Estimates of population differentiation based on RAPD are moderate as measured by amova (Φ ST = 0.21), Wright's F‐statistics (G ST = 0.26), or Shannon's information index (H among = 0.30). However, genetic and geographic distances are not significantly correlated, suggesting a lack of interpopulation gene flow and/or genetic drift within populations. Population size is not a good predictor of genetic variation in the present study, and it is hypothesized that plant dormancy patterns and chaotic fluctuations in population size from year to year may buffer against stochastic events, especially in small populations.
Lisa E. Wallace (Mon,) studied this question.